In some instances, a document can include text that may be illegible such as, for example, a faded receipt, an old book, or a low-contrast reverse text document (e.g., a document that includes a dark background and light foreground text). In such instances, it may be difficult for a reader, particularly a visually impaired reader, to perceive the content of the document.
Existing solutions and methods for making such documents legible are limited. For instance, some existing systems may involve converting an electronic version of the document (e.g., an image of the document or a scanned version of the document) into machine-encoded text using optical character recognition techniques. However, optical character recognition techniques may be unable to accurately or properly identify or detect illegible characters or letters on such documents, which can prevent such systems from generating or outputting a version of the document that includes legible text. Moreover, conventional systems and methods for making such documents legible may involve manually adjusting an overall contrast level of the foreground and/or an overall contrast level of the background of the electronic version of the document. However, adjusting the overall contrast levels of the foreground and/or background of the electronic version of the document may not account for variations in contrast levels throughout the document, which can cause current systems and methods to generate a version of the document that is nonetheless illegible. In addition, conventional systems and methods for adjusting contrast levels of a document may not separate the foreground and background of the document. Rather, such conventional methods and systems may involve using one or more image contrast enhancement filters that may not account for differences between background pixels and foreground pixels.
Thus, existing systems and methods for converting a document that includes illegible text into a legible version of the document present disadvantages such as, but not limited to, those discussed above. As a result, a user or reader, such as a visually impaired user, may not be able to perceive the content of the documents.